Using Google

[Skhilled]

You type in a search term into Goggle and get thousands of items for what you are looking for...and usually, tens of thousands more items that you are not looking for. 

This is not Google's fault but more of how you used it. Look at this scenario. You enter "chicken" in the search box while looking for chicken recipes and press enter. What are the results? You are likely to get results for the following:

   
• information on types of live chickens
• chicken recipes
• how to raise and care for chickens
• stores that sell chicken
• how to buy chicken
• and a lot more...

So, how do you make it only show what you want it to show you? Well, you can start by being a lot more specific about what you are looking for. Typing in "chicken recipes" will get you chicken recipes with all kinds of ingredients. But, what if you do not like or are allergic to something? How do you filter it out?

Well, this topic will attempt to show you various ways to accomplish this. At least once per week, I will show you different ways of searching to find exactly what you are looking for.

However...please keep in mind that search engines such as Google, Yahoo, etc. first look at the search terms of a web site in their filtering. So, if I added terms for this site like "SMF", "forum", "chicken", this site should show somewhere in the listing for each those terms! Yes, even chicken although there is nothing in this site about it except in this topic!  Search engines will also read your site and find words added to it and may even use some of those words in its searches! This is also how you may get adult sites when searching for something completely unrelated.

Here is the first one...

Most search engines will take each word of your search terms and give you results based on those terms. So, if you typed in "chicken recipes" you will probably get sites for chicken, chicken recipes, and recipes, in general. Why? At it's most basic, search engines will search for the exact words you enter into it. and importantly, it will look for those words in te order you entered them. So, in our example "chicken recipes", it will search for the term "chicken recipes" first, followed by "chicken", then "recipes". If you enter "recipes containing chicken" you results may be very different. Using quotation marks around your terms will give you exact results. However, if the sites you may be trying to find do not include them in their terms you may not find the site or it may be way down the list of thousands of sites!

So, remember to be specific and the order of your words do matter! 

[Skhilled]

Use quotations around words you want or need to be including in your searches.  The results will show only sites that have those words in the title or contained somwhere in the text of the site itself.

Use quotes will also preoduce a more exact result. Let's say you try "chicken" in one search and "chicken recipes" in another search. The firs, "chicken" will yield just about anything to do with
"chicken" while "chicken recipes" will yield only sites about (or contain the words) "chicken recipes". Remember, that just because a site contains those words does not mean that is what the site is about.

[beast]

  Hey! I didn't know that. About the quotations. That will be very helpful, and placing the wording right will help also. Thank You. I am going to keep up on this board and see all the helpful things I can learn.

   

[Ken.]

Very handy tip.